"Guides to Beyond" Meditation Retreat

Bodhipaksa, the retreat leader, describes the weekend's theme as follows:

"Borrowing a phrase from Rumi, I call our distractions "messengers from beyond" because I see them as being "the tragic expressions of unmet needs" (this time borrowing a phrase from Marshall Rosenberg). I see each hindrance as being the mind's poorly educated attempt to find peace, and our task being to find a wiser way to bring that peace into being through intuiting and meeting our needs.

"The problem with the hindrances is of course that they don't generate peace, but it's important to realize that they are not "the enemy". The underlying motivation that each hindrance has (no matter how unpleasant or "unspiritual" the distraction may seem on the surface) is to bring us peace. Each hindrance is expressive of a real need which we much fulfill in order to become happy.

"When we look at each hindrance in a nonreactive way, we can intuit what that underlying need is. This may require some time spent just sitting with the hindrance, giving it our care and attention, as if it were an old friend who has turned up on the doorstep in an unhappy state. We need to invite the hindrance in, sit with it, and listen. That listening is not passive, of course. It involves an attitude of gentle curiosity to help the hindrance unpack itself, and to reveal its mesage to us so that we can grow and develop.

"This is what we'll be practicing on the weekend retreat: learning to sit with our distractions in an appreciative, compassionate, and curious way."